Tag: making money online free

So, you want to make money online for free? And by â€œfreeâ€ I mean you donâ€™t really want to buy the latest money-making-shiny-object out there that is promising to make you money over night; you want to start a business on nothing!

Although there are some great resources out there you might want to consider someday, letâ€™s focus on what is not going to cost you any money out of the gate.

Just follow these three stepsâ€¦

Step One â€“ Have Someplace for People To Go.

When you need a free website, turn to WordPress.com. The dot com WordPress is free. Although you will be somewhat limited to what you can do with it (revenue wise vs self-hosted) it will get you off the ground and we are suppose to be sticking to â€œfreeâ€ methods in this article.

You can build a site and they host it. There are also plenty of free websites themes to choose from so you are bound to find something that fits your business model.

Pick a topic and try to make it very specific. A site about fishing, ok. But still too broad. A site about fly-fishing the Pacific Northwest Rivers. Even better.

You canâ€™t write to everyone. So donâ€™t make your topic too broad. You are just looking for a group of people (readers) that will be passionate enough to read your stuff.

Step Two â€“ Content and Promote

Write Unique Content – Stay away from those article spinners out there. Just write something that comes from the heart in your own voice. Donâ€™t hold anything back when it comes to revealing your true personality to your readers â€“ some will hate your for itâ€¦but the bulk will love it.

Promote on Social Media â€“ Get a Facebook Fan Page. Get a Twitter account. Whenever you provide something of value, link to your website. Donâ€™t pitch anything. That comes later. Try and connect with others that are doing the same thing or have the same hobby (those will be future buyers or cross promoters).

Get a Name â€“ You have to collect names. It is about building a list of people that like and trust you. There are a couple decent ways to gain followers on the .com version but this is where you will start wanting the .org version. You may have some luck integrating mail systems like MailChimp (free) but it will require a little bit of coding. You want people to opt-in to your list (so they can get a bribe or some free updates later). This will be your best method when it comes to selling later.

Step Three â€“ Make Some Money

NEVER try and sell stuff right out of the gate. The biggest mistake I see people make is that they have banners and affiliate links immediatelyâ€¦so much in fact I donâ€™t even know what the site is about.

You donâ€™t have permission to sell people yet. When people come to the site mentioned above, they leave. They get the game. You only provided a minimum amount of content to try and sell them something.

Howeverâ€¦

Once you have opened up the dialogue (lots of posts, comments, conversations) you know have permission to sell using these methodsâ€¦.

Affiliate links (usually good when you do some sort of review of the item).

Banner advertisements (if you have enough traffic)

eMail Marketing

The last one is my favorite.

This is how you can keep the big G happy and still make money. Think of it this wayâ€¦

People sign up for contentâ€¦.they donâ€™t sign up to buy things.

Give them content. Â They will love you for it. They opt-in to your mailing list because they want to stay in touch. You then send them, every so often, solid content they can use (in your niche of course).

If you keep sending them solid content, after every 3-4 communications, you get to drop in a sale.

So, there you have it. The â€œFREEâ€ make money on the Internet model.

Do I think it is the best model? To some extent. I do think you really need to host your own site, which opens up a lot of sales options (the .org version of WordPress).

In the end, as long as you follow these three steps to making money online free, you have a real shot doing well and building an online business.